285th HiRISE Cycle: Western imaging Martian Spring

Martian Northern Spring is here! … and our Western University-based team is once again helping to plan a 2-week set of HiRISE images of Mars (HiRISE is a high-resolution camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter – MRO). The Western-based team is led by Earth Sciences Adjunct Research Professor Dr. Livio Tornabene (@RocDocMars) – a veteran HiRISE Science team member, and Co-Investigator on the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter imager – CaSSIS. The Western-based team includes Department of Earth Science postdoc Eric Pilles (@EPilles), research tech. Radu Capitan, and research associate Matt Bourassa (@DocBourassa). The team will be enjoying another exciting imaging campaign, the 285th, with the University of Arizona’s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory HiRISE Operations Team, and HiRISE targeting specialist (HiTS) Nicole Baugh. This will be the 6th time the Western-based team has taken the lead with the science-planning of HiRISE images from Canada. The planning for the next several weeks will be taking place at the Centre of Planetary Science and Exploration’s (CPSX) mission control facility, which is housed in the Department of Physics and Astronomy.

The 285th HiRISE imaging campaign executes on Saturday, September 30 and continues toSaturday, October 14th as Mars continues into Northern Spring/Southern Fall. The team anticipates taking ~150 images, including current and future landing sites, and seasonal processes such as the defrosting of the northern expanses of Mars.

For the latest updates, and a sneak peek of their images of Mars follow them on Facebook and Twitter at @RocDocMars and @WesternUCPSX